Horticulture – Hydroponic Economics

Container Gardening vs Hydroponics

What is Better for Your Indoor Garden?

There are a few factors for you to consider when setting up your indoor garden. You must first decide if you are going to be using soil or hydroponics. If you are new to gardening, I suggest starting with soil until you learn the effects of your fertilizer on your plants. If you are growing a variety of plants, I highly recommended starting with soil. You can work your way up to hydroponics by building your own drip system for your indoor garden.

Read the Introduction to Drip Systems and then come back here. If you are ready for hydroponics read this: Guide: Circulating Drip System and then come back.

Benefits of Container Gardening

-Easy to get started

-Easy to maintain

-Little gardening knowledge required

Modifying the Circulating Drip System for Soil Container Gardens

To make the Circulating Drip System into a regular drip system for your container garden, you will just need to take the containers off the reservoir and into a Drain Table. There is a guide for building a homemade drain table here. It is for small plants, if you fill it with large containers it will tumble over. For bigger containers, you can buy a strong drain table or just sit them on something you can drain every day.

Benefits of a Hydroponics Garden

-Higher Yields

-More control of what goes into your plants

-Automation

Product Review: Annie Haven’s Natural Moo Poo

Every gardener is always looking for new nutrients to try. If you prefer real natural fertilizer, Annie Haven’s Moo Poo is for you. Moo Poo is an all natural soil conditioner made from life stock manure. It is also known as manure tea.

The Moo Poo comes in tea bag sized pouches that you let seep into water for a few days before use. It is a really simple process for some really strong organics.

One tea bag can make as much as 5 gallons of nutrients. If you are using a hydroponics system, I suggest using one tea bag for 10 gallons or more. You can really make these go a long way.

The natural tea is perfect for all kinds of plants. You can use it indoors or outdoors. It is good for container gardens, outdoor gardens, and even hydroponics.

Hydroponic gardeners will be able to get 90+ gallons of fertilizer out of the 9 pack which is only $22. Thats the same price you are paying for nutrients now.

There are three types of manure tea from the ManureTea.com shop. You can choose from horse or cow manure for your vegetable garden. There is also an alfalfa mix for roses.

Click here to learn more.

Plant Growth: How Do Plants Grow?

How DO plants grow? Did you ever stop and think about it? When you notice little movements from day to day, you know your plant is growing. It seems like those leaves just pop out of no where doesn’t it?

Today you are going to learn a little horticulture 101. You are going to find out exactly how plants grow. Plant growth is an interesting topic, because before we had microscopes, there was only speculation on how plants grew. There are a few key terms we must define:

Horticulture: “A process by which a plot of soil is prepared for the planting of seeds, tubers, or cuttings.” About.com Archaeology. We are going to let horticulture encompass all of hydroponics as well.
Meristem: The Meristem is the part of a plant that is capable of cell division.
Cell Division: The process by which cells multiply. The cells multiply by constantly dividing. (No pun intended).

Where Does Plant Growth Happen?

Plant growth can only occur where there is cell division. Cell division occurs at the Apical Meristem. You can think of this as the top node. It is the node that is just popping up. If you have ever topped your plant to bush it out and spread the top nodes, you cut the apical meristem.

Apical Meristem

The apical meristem can be cut to make two new top branches. The meristem doesn’t physically split into two branches. The two shoots below the apical meristem, both become apical meristems. It is actually a cool trick for the plant to make two apical meristems, because if another one got cut or damaged, it could continue growing. You’ll find that if you chop off both of the other two apical meristems, you will have four apical meristems.

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Spring Garden Planning: When to Start Seeds

Are you preparing for your Spring Garden? Do you know when to start your seeds or is that why you’re here? Its a common question/anticipation between gardeners everywhere. When should I start my seeds?

You can closely watch your weather forecasts and plan the frost dates of your zone, but it takes a lot of time. Time that a lot of you don’t have. I’ve found an easy solution to the age old Spring Garden planning dilemma.

Do you want to know what it is? GrowVeg.com

What is GrowVeg.com?

GrowVeg.com is a Garden Planning service. You sign up for an account(Free 30 Day Trial) and plan out your garden. You can choose the type of plants you are growing and set up automatic reminders for yourself.

Why Should You Care?

You can plan out the varieties of plants you want so you don’t forget any. GrowVeg also allows you to setup automatic reminders, so you can plant varieties on the exact days you want. GrowVeg will adapt to your zone and tell you when to plant your seeds. You will get a reminder saying when its time to start seeds.

GrowVeg also remembers your garden for next year. You won’t have to replan your garden. When Spring time comes around, planning your garden will be a piece of cake.

What are you waiting for? Give it a shot for Free here.